


when the battle's lost and won

by nsfwarlocks



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-07
Updated: 2015-04-07
Packaged: 2018-03-21 17:50:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3701259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nsfwarlocks/pseuds/nsfwarlocks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bethany and Isabela run into some trouble while walking through Lowtown.</p>
            </blockquote>





	when the battle's lost and won

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RoseMeister](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RoseMeister/gifts).



Lowtown at night was a strange, quiet place; the merchants had all left when the sun set, and, except for the bustle of activity around the Hanged Man, Isabela and Bethany seemed to be the only ones on the streets.

 

“So there I was,” Isabela said, “shipless, friendless, not a sovereign to my name, in a foreign port. As a cutpurse I make a good sailor, so I just sat in a tavern and waited for people to buy me drinks. Worked pretty well. Mind you, I wore less then than I do now.” Isabela smirked, and Bethany felt her face go warm. “Finally, after three days sleeping in the taproom, the largest woman I’ve ever seen found me - she must’ve been seven feet tall. Qunari - Tal-Vashoth. She was a smuggler, dashing up and down the coast in a sweet little cutter, taking anything she could carry. Anyway, she challenges me to a drinking contest - fifty sovereigns if I won.”

 

“But you were penniless - what if you lost?”

 

Isabela turned towards Bethany with a raised eyebrow.

 

“Oh.”

 

Isabela was about to say something, half-smiling, when her expression darkened. one hand going to her belt. “Sweetness, I hate to say it, but I think we’re being followed.”

 

Bethany listened, counting the footsteps behind them. “Five?

 

“I’d guess six. We picked them up by the docks. I’d rather not be robbed, kidnapped, murdered, or any combination of the three, so be ready when I move.”

 

Isabela walked on and Bethany followed, until they found a long, straight stretch between buildings, with no alleyways for enemy reinforcements to hide in.

 

“Now,” Isabela grated, and in one motion, she spun on her heel and threw her belt knife into the throat of the leading pursuer.

 

They were dressed in the Tevinter style - slavers? - and there were five still standing. Bethany felt the Fade move around her, through her - somehow more real at night than during the day - and in a moment of perfect, implacable calm she called on the energy all around her and enveloped two men in hungry flames.

 

“Watch the mage!” said a man in the back - the leader, judging by his fancy hat. “Ten sovereigns to the man who brings her in alive.”

 

Isabela was moving - she fished her knife out of her first victim’s throat and left it in the shoulder of the next man, then moved to engage him with a dagger in each hand. He carried a wicked-looking chain with barbs in it, swinging it in one hand. His wounded shoulder dribbled blood down his arm, and he looked ready to spill some of Isabela’s blood in exchange. But she was untouchable - she spun away from a vicious lash of the chain, then danced behind her opponent and cut his throat with a brutal precision.

 

Bethany was hard-pressed with the last two - the leader had proven to be a mage himself, and Bethany was barely keeping him at bay with bolts of energy from her staff. She cast a lightning bolt that struck the man closest to her - the one with a sword - in the chest, then continued on to the mage behind him. The swordsman fell, the mage took a staggering step back, and in the blink of an eye Isabela was there, driving her dagger into the enemy mage’s gut. He sank to the ground, screaming; he would have a foul, slow, bad death.

 

“Are you slavers?” Isabela asked, and the mage spit at her. With a curl of her lip, she cut his throat. Bethany checked the men she’d fought - the burned ones were dead, but the man she’d struck with lightning was still breathing. She said as much to Isabela, looked away as she gave him the mercy-stroke. then helped Isabela go through the dead men’s pockets.

 

Nothing to identify them, of course; not so much as an Imperial coin. Bethany sat back with a sigh, then noticed dark trails running down Isabela’s arm and hurried to her. “You’re hurt! You should have said something.”

 

Isabela looked at her arm. “I didn’t even notice. Maker’s balls, that’s deep.” She looked a bit queasy, and Bethany helped her sit down.

 

“Here -” Bethany said, and cast a healing. The soft light of the spell lit Isabela’s face, somehow making her look both younger and older than she was.

 

“Ah, that’s -” Isabela tipped her head back against the wall of the building she leaned against, closing her eyes as the healing magic closed her wound. “Much better.”

 

Bethany drew her hand away, suddenly aware of how long she’d been touching Isabela’s arm. “We can get you cleaned up at the Hanged Man. Just a few more blocks, now. Can you walk?”

 

Isabela shooed her away. “It’s my arm, not my leg.” Nevertheless, she did wobble a bit as she stood, and Bethany stayed close, ready to catch her if she stumbled. Slowly, they made their way to the tavern.

 

The taproom was warm and bright compared to the sea-breezes and moonlight outside. Isabela paused at the door to her own room.

 

“It’s much too late for you to walk home alone, sweetness. There are dangerous people about.”

“Is that so?” Isabela was warm and close.

 

“Why, just tonight, I heard an apostate and a pirate killed six men.”

 

“That does sound dangerous. Perhaps - perhaps I should stay here ‘til morning, then.”

 

“That might be even more dangerous.” There was a glint in Isabela’s eye, and Bethany’s breath seemed to catch in her throat.

 

“I don’t mind,” she said, and let Isabela shut the door behind her.

 

 


End file.
